Robust decentralized coordinated attitude control of spacecraft formation

The attitude coordinated control problem for spacecraft within a formation is investigated. A class of decentralized coordinated attitude control laws using behavior-based control approach is proposed. The control laws differ by the coordination connections used in the spacecraft formation. The choice of behavior weights defines the coordination connections. In the presence of model uncertainties and external disturbances, the presented class of controllers can guarantee globally asymptotical reachability of a given desired trajectory. The convergence and stability of the proposed class of controllers for the resulting closed-loop system are proved theoretically. Numerical simulations are also included to reinforce the analytic results and to investigate the effect of the coordination connections on control performance.